🗣️ Breaking the silence
It's important to take the taboo out of talking about founder mental health. 💬🧠
The journey of entrepreneurship is filled with ups and downs, and it's okay to acknowledge the emotional challenges that come with it. 💪💼
🌟 Founders are 11 times more likely to be on the bipolar spectrum💡
The entrepreneurial path is a unique journey filled with intensity and unpredictability. Acknowledging and addressing mental health in this context is crucial, ensuring founders have the support they need to thrive 🚀🧠
🚀 Are you spending too long perfecting pitch decks and chasing investment? ⏳💼
Consider this: obsessing over funding can slow you down, especially when your business might not even require it!
Shift your focus to delivering value, growing organically, and ensuring your product or service meets customer needs. Sometimes, the best investment is in your own growth and sustainability. 🌱💡
🤩 Investors are crucial to your startup journey, but remember: don't put them on a pedestal! 🚀💼
While their support is invaluable, it's essential to maintain a balanced perspective. Idolizing investors can lead to misplaced priorities.
Stay true to your vision, focus on your product or service
🤔 Asking questions and seeking guidance is a superpower, especially when building bridges and trying to sell within an organization
Don't hesitate to dive deep, be empathetic, and find that key person who holds the insights you seek 🗝️🤝
Understanding how the organisation works inside out can pave a the way for collaboration 🚀🧠
Start from the customer first, understand their pain points and really try to feel how they feel and work backwards
Don't be a broadcaster, be a listener
🤔 Fundraising for your business? 🚀 It all starts with asking the right questions!
Your fundraising strategy is the compass guiding your journey
What should you be asking yourself as a first time founder?
👋 Saying goodbye to a business you've nurtured and grown is never easy- even when you’re selling it.🌱💼
The journey from the initial spark of an idea to scaling a successful venture is a rollercoaster ride of dedication, hard work, and countless ups and downs 🎢
But sometimes, for personal or professional reasons, it's necessary to let it go. It's okay to feel a mix of emotions – pride in your accomplishments, sadness at parting, and excitement for what lies ahead 🌟
Remember, the experiences and lessons from this journey will always be a part of you, guiding your future endeavors 🚀
Embrace the power of questions!
Don't shy away – find your go-to mentor within your business for invaluable guidance. 🗝️💡
Starting a business is a thrilling yet challenging journey, and there's no shame in seeking help when you need it 🌱🙋♂️.
Identify the seasoned pro who can provide insights, share experiences, and help you navigate the startup landscape with confidence! 🌟🤝
🦄 Unicorn or go home 🏡
VCs will only take you seriously if they think you can hit a $1bn valuation 💰
Sadly most startups will never hit that 📉
So why do you need to have the potential to be a unicorn? 🤔🚀 #StartupJourney
Credit: @websummit
Unlocking the secrets to successful fundraising with a VC 🌟💼
Here are five essential tips for securing your investment goals if you decide to go for VC 🚀🔑 #StartupSuccess #VCInsights
Credit: @websummit
VCs only want unicorns 🦄
As a startup, you're one of many investments from a VC and many of those investments will fail 📉
So if you aren't targeting and delivering on a billion-dollar valuation, they won't take you seriously 💰🚫
Credit: @websummit
Build a business, raise money through a VC... 💼
You've heard it all before, but... 🤔
Not all startups fit the VC model 🚫
Here's why 📊
Credit: @websummit
Mistakes are stepping stones on the path to success 🚀
In the world of entrepreneurship, errors are inevitable, but they're also invaluable lessons 📚💡
Embrace the process of learning from your missteps, and you'll find yourself building a stronger, more resilient business in the end 🌟👣🏢
Mental health matters in startups more than you might think 💡
The high-pressure environment can take a toll on your well-being 📉
Prioritizing mental health not only benefits you but also fuels creativity and productivity 🌱💪
Having a good co-founder is a game-changer in the startup world 🤝
Too many startups falter due to co-founder conflicts 🙅♂️🙅♀️
Hear from Alberta talk about how her proudest moment is having a strong co-founder
What happens when your product makes investors uncomfortable? 🥴
You turn a fundraising hurdle into a great filtering system! 💸
We love Valentina's candour about how hard it is to talk about Vagina's in front of investors (male and female). We're just not ready as a society at large to not cringe and feel awkward.
But sometimes the things that make fundraising hardest are the ones that mean you end up with the right people on the journey with you!
Anyone backing a gynaecology focused startup has to be able to get comfortable talking about the topic- otherwise how will they champion the business.
It's brutal when you're trying to fundraise around a taboo topic and it makes life that much harder - but know that one day you could be on a podcast talking about how it turned out to be a massive silver lining to who invested.
What have been the hardest moments for those of you fundraising?
#startups #taboo #femtech #healthtech #entrepreneurship #founder #fundraising #investment
✅ Why repeat founders have it easier- especially if they've failed along the way! ☠️
Hear us out!
Failed founders often have a deep humility that helps them test their assumptions faster.
Plus, as long as you didn't fail because of gross incompetence or shady behaviour- the network you build in your first startup is something you keep!
That includes partners, investors, and champions for you as a founder.
It's one reason fundraising gets easier the more companies you've done it for.
Another is that investors have a bit of a sense that you know what you're in for, and that you can grow a business from scratch (even if you kill it along the way).
Now we know - it can be sooo frustrating to hear as a first time founder, because there's not much you can do in the moment, and it does make it harder building this startup you love so much.
But, try to remind yourself that this just means you're putting in the hardest yards now, and the payoff is coming down the line.
Investing in yourself as a founder for the first startup is a serious investment for anything else you'll go onto build too!
And if you feel like you're failing now- hopefully it helps to know it won't put people off working with you in the future!
In fact- it may do the opposite!
#serialfounders #firsttimefounders #entrepreneurship #startups #founder
"The questions female founders get asked are MAD 🤯
The idea that a man must have been doing something behind the scenes.
It's so mad that so many people still find it hard to believe this is happening to women raising - all the time.
We've heard about bias from so many podcast guests- but Valentina shone a particularly bright light on how much harder it is to be taken seriously as a female founder- let alone layering on biases about being Eastern European, not having gone to a prestigious university, and not having worked at a big consultancy.
What biases have you experienced in the startup ecosystem? Let us know in the comments below!
And if you want to hear more of Valentina's amazing story growing Daye - checkout our Fundraising Special 2, or her full episode, by searching 'Valentina Not My First Guess' wherever you get your podcasts!
#startups #fundraising #femalefounder #bias #investment #sexism #entrepreneurship"
Fancy winning a free ticket to Sifted Summit to learn from incredible founders like @danmurrayserter, @trinnywoodall, and @jessicaennishill ?🎟🤩
To celebrate recording our first live episode at Sifted Summit 2022, we've got 15 tickets to give away on Instagram and 20 tickets on LinkedIn.
Enter for your chance to join 1500 founders, startup operators and investors live at Magazine London.
To enter our LinkedIn Comp:
- Follow @notmyfirstguess
- Like this post
- Share this post, tagging @notmyfirstguess and telling us one takeaway you've had from the show so far, or something you're excited to learn from it if you haven't listened yet!
Competition closes on 16th September at 23.59 GMT.
We'll draw 15 winners at random, and each winner will get a code to redeem 1 x free ticket. We'll notify winners within 7 days of the competition closing.
If you fancy bringing a friend, don't forget to tag them so they don't miss the chance to enter too!
Full competition T&C's in our bio, along with a link to enter our LinkedIn comp if you fancy doubling your chances of winning🏆!
#giveaway #startups #founders
Fundraising can be a confidence destroyer… hang in there.
@thrivahealth has raised $14.7m so far... but it wasn't easy, especially with 3 first time founders.
In the latest episode of Not My First Guess Podcast, @brooksyea shares one particular week where they really thought it was over, when they got rejections from their whole pipeline.
If you're fundraising now, and it's a slog, take feedback and iterate where you can, but remember, difficulty fundraising is not proof your business won't work.
Link to listen to the full episode in bio!
#fundraising #startup #scaleup
